By CHARLES IWUOHA

Goods worth over N1 billion were in the early morning of Wednesday destroyed in a fire outbreak at the Ebonyi State International Market on Wednesday.

The fire affected one of the largest warehouses in the market.

News Express gathered that the cause of the fire incident, which started around 2:00 am, is yet to be ascertained.

Also, the fire is yet to be put off as of the time of filing this report at about 5:38Pm.

Speaking to newsmen, the brother of the owner of the affected warehouses, Mr Chidi Okechukwu, blamed the incident on poor security management in the market.

He said: “If I’m to say, the security personnel in the market knows when this fire started. We have no adequate security in this market.”

Okechukwu explained that the owner of the warehouse is the highest distributor of indomie nodules, tomato and other beverages.

“The owner of the warehouse is one of my brothers. This fire incident was said to have started by 2:00 am last night and have continued up till now and yet all efforts to quench it has not yielded any fruit.

“Many fire service officers are here, both the state and federal fire service officers. The sympathizers are also helping to quench the fire but there is no headway.

“All the goods in this large warehouse have been burnt down. The worth of the goods destroyed is billions of naira. The warehouse is filled with goods from up to downstairs. It is regrettable that the goods have been burnt to ashes,” he added.

Okechukwu insinuated that the fire could be an act of sabotage, as he described it as mysterious.

He said: “You can’t attribute it to power surge because there is no electricity in the International Market. It is very strange and surprising to us to hear that the warehouse is gutted by fire. From which source?

“We may not say it is somebody that did it. It is only God who know what really happened.”

But the Chairman of the International Market, Lot One, Mr Peter Oba, said the incident was caused by a solar energy battery that was installed to power the CCTV camera inside the warehouse.

He called on the state government to come to the assistance of the owner of the warehouse.

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